


Sun Damage

by toomanyhometowns



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Agoraphobia, Don't copy to another site, Gen, a teeny bit of Lavernius Tucker, or something
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-01
Updated: 2014-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 22:53:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26446645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/toomanyhometowns/pseuds/toomanyhometowns
Summary: There’s a window where Wash could’ve told the truth, but he let it pass in a breath.“Me? I just liked the armour.”
Kudos: 2
Collections: tumblrfic exodus





	Sun Damage

**Author's Note:**

> It's the time of Quar when I upload ancient fic! This one gave me a real "the past is a foreign country" feeling--I'm only vaguely convinced I know what I was doing, but for completeness, here it is anyway!

"Why did you enlist?"

"Well, I told my career counsellor that I dreamed of drowning in my own ball-sweat on a planet nobody had ever heard of, fighting a war nobody cared about," Tucker said, clearly hitting his storytelling stride. "And Mrs. Mackintosh, she said it sounded like the marines could hook me _up_ , you know? Make my all wishes come true, put these dreams into reality. So as soon as I got of enlistin' age, I signed all the papers they put in front of me and shipped off to serve the glorious cause of the UNSC."

"Uh-huh." Wash tried to pack as much dryness into those two syllables as he could.

"What's your story, soldier? Couldn't control that ferocious bloodlust, wanted to channel it into socially-acceptable venues?"

There's a window where Wash could've told the truth, but he let it pass in a breath.

"Me? I just liked the armour."

–

Washington eats in his armour. Washington sleeps in his armour. The armour has been tested for resistance to heat, cold, water, pressure, and the vacuum of space. Washington is going to _die_ in his armour.

He hasn't had a shower in a while, but the Freelancer gear is a step up from the stuff he wore before he was tapped for the program, so he doesn't smell or anything. It was designed to get rid of all waste materials, after all.

When he was in basic, there was one kid in his platoon who had been obsessed with this media series from the 20th century. Washington didn't get much from it other than the concept of sonic showers, which seemed like pure genius. There wasn't a lot of water to go around in space, after all, and being cleaned by soundwaves seemed efficient. Better than what he was ordered to do in basic, strip down to nothing, stand exposed in a lukewarm stream for interminable minutes as he wriggled his toes and reminded himself that he had a backbone, a ribcage, no shell.

Washington hasn't died in his armour yet. He hasn't died out of it, either. He keeps on living.

–

As a kid, David got sunburned shamefully easily. Summers at the lake smelled like zinc oxide and calamine lotion, and felt like too-hot skin bubbled with blisters.

"Go inside, Davey. Get out of the sun."

David kept hunting for stripy snail shells. If he pretended he didn't hear Mom, he could sometimes get a few extra minutes outside.

"Davey, what did I say?"

Reluctantly: "Go inside."

"You have to take care of yourself, kiddo." This was as close as his dad got to reproachful. "The sun's too strong for you."

David dripped and sulked all the way to the cabin.


End file.
